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Transfiguration; the Rev. Father
Coppo, the Rev. Father S. Gianetto;
fifty more priests, Civil Justice
George F. Roesch, Dr. Isola, Alessan
dro Caecio and Dr. Lorenzo Ullo.
Poor Ores Cost Steel Concerns $60,-
000,000.
Sixty million dollars must be spent
by the steel concerns of the country
in changing their Bessemer plants to
the open-hearth process, owing to the
slump in the quality of the Besse
mer ores. That Bessemer steel rails
will be advanced seems certain.
The Steel Trust has begun its
change to open-hearth furnaces by
closing the big Bessemer department
of the Duquesne, the Edgar Thomp
son and the Homestead plants.
Telegraphers Send Brief to Roose
velt.
The brief relative to the telegraph
strike which was asked for by Pres
ident Roosevelt has been sent by
mail to Washington from Chicago.
President Small, of the telegraphers’
Union, it was said, will later confer
with Government officials regarding
the brief.
One leader of the telegraphers said
recently that when President Small
returns he will be asked to sanction
a general strike of brokers’ operators
In case he refuses his sanction, it is
said, the mater will be put to a ref
erendum vote.
JUSTICE OF RAILWAY AGITA
TION; HOW THE PEOPLE’S
CAUSE HAS BEEN VIN
DICATED.
So convincing have been the proofs
with which charges against railroad
officials in this country have been
backed up, and so overwhelming has
been the cumulative evidence piled
up against them, that the fight of
the people against mismanagement
and injustice on the part of rail
way corporations in the United States
has reached that point where there
are practically no longer any persons
who scoff at the efforts of the masses
as unreasonable. What was but re
cently called by some papers and a
few people “railway agitation” is
now 'regarded as a righteous cause,
justice of which has been fully
demonstrated. That part of the press
which was bold enough to enter the
fight at the outset and aid in the
demands of the people followed by
practipally all independent members
of the press, and the efforts of the
press as a whole have been thorough
ly and entirely vindicated.
It is interesting to note the change
that has come over many reputable
journals which at first hesitated to
take the part of the people in a fight,
the causes of which were not at first
entirely understood and the final
issue of which was not at all
certain. There have been, of course,
many papers which have not added
their protest at all against railway
discrimination and the hundred oth
er forms of injustice and neglect that
have been practiced by the railway
corporations'of the country. There
are various reasons for such hesitant
cy, some being too eon-eivative to
appear in behalf ofz popular agita
tion and others being so controlled
by railroad men that it was impos
sible for them to enter into any tight,
just or unjust, asrmmt railroad prac
tices. But practically all newspa
pers not in this last mentioned class
have, during the past few months,
swung to the side of the people and,
though some of their voices have not
been lifted with too great volume, all
have voiced the sentiments of the
people and have openly admitted the
justice of their cause.
As an instance of the change in
attitude on the part of those news
papers which have held back until
the last, and until victory for the
people was certain, we note a recent
full page article entitled, “The Fight
Is On Between the Railroads and the
Government,” so plainly anti-railroad
in its tone as to create surprise among
those readers who have during recent
months noted the evident reluctance
of the paper in question to publish
anything that might appear to be
against the wishes of railway men.
In this article we find the following
interesting paragraphs: .
“Here are some of the things which
have been done by railroads since the
new Inter-state Commerce act took
effect last September. Some of them
are in retaliation for that legisla
tion, some for the regulative acts
passed by the states, some are appar
ently without especial motive but sim
ply based .on the proposition that the
railroads ‘need the money.’:
“Freight rates on iron and steel
products have been advanced prac
tically throughout the entire country.
“Freight rates on lumber have
been advanced throughout an immense
section of the northwest, m many
cases, it is alleged, as much as 40 per
cent,
“The special low rates which have
for years been given on manufactures
intended for export are being with
drawn.
“A readjustment of the freight
rates from the big central valleys,
where most of the grain is raised, to
the seaboard has been effected, which
includes increases in most of the ter
ritory east of the Mississippi.
“A refusal to continue the commod
ity rates on which the strawberry
crop of Tennessee was moved in past
years to points in the north resulted
in immense losses to the raisers and
the waste of a considerable part of
this season’s crop.”
With regard to two cent fare leg
islation the article directly charges
that the roads are seeking to inconve
nience the people merely for the sake
of retaliation and not from motives
of an economical or infiancial charac
ter. It states the situation in this
regard as follows:
“In lowa, because the State legisla
ture has passed h maximum rate law
applying within the state and adopted
an official schedule of maximum rates
covering the state railroads have in
creased interstate rates into and-out
of lowa so that they have franklv
boasted that lowa was being severely
punished for its effort to regulate.
“In Nebraska, where a two cent
fare bill passed last winter, the rail
roads announced that they had taken
off some of their best and fastest
trains in retaliation.
“In Kansas, because of a two cent
and other retaliatory laws, the roads
have taken off some of their trains,
and are running others on slower
schedules than before.
“In Virginia, where there is a state
law requiring that loaded freight ears
must be moved at least twenty-five
miles a day, the railroads have adopt
ed the policy of setting out interstate
freight op the side tracks and letting
it wait indefinitely till the state
WATSON'S WEnXY JIFFBMONIAN
freight is moved the required mini
mu#i. In the same state, because a
two cent fare bill has passed, the rail
roads have decided to pay no heed to
it, but to litigate as long as they can
and kill the legislation if possible.
“In West Virginia the railroads
sent an immense lobby to the capitol
to fight a two cent fare bill, and a
good deal of scandal developed, but
the measure passed. Now the roads
announce that they will decline to
obey, and instead will fight it in the
courts.
‘ ‘ In general, the threat has been in
dulged by railroad lobbyists and even
by responsible executive officers that
improvements, extensions, the con
struction of new lines, etc., will be
stopped just as fastsiis possible unless
the regulative hand of federal and
state government is removed from the
transportation business.”
The above statement of the situa
tion certainly does not make any ef
fort to represent the attitude of rail
way men as a benevolent one, or to
indicate that they are at all repent
ant for past abuses. On the other
hand, it defines their attitude as open
ly defiant and in accordance with the
words of a well-known representative
of corporate wealth, “The public be
damned.” That a newspaper, which
has hitherto carefully refrained from
adopting a severe tone when discuss
ing railroad subjects, should so state
the existing situation, is no less en
couraging than surprising.—The Au
gusta (Ga.) Herald.
AFRICA’S NEGRO REPUBLIC.
Arthur Barclay, the president of Li
beria, is at present in England, where
he has gone, it is believed, to try to
induce English capitalists to make
further investments in his countrv.
Liberia, with an area approximately >.
equal to that of Holland and Belgium
together, is bounded on the north
west by British territory, and on the
east afiff south by French territory.
It was founded in 1822 as a place
of settlement for emancipated Ameri
can slaves, under the protection of
the United States. Tn 1847 it was
recognized by England and France as
an independent republic, and in 1861
by the United States. The constitu
tion imitales that of the United
States, providing for a president, sen
ate, house of representatives and su
preme court. The “American” Li
berians, who form the governing class,
number, it is stated, about 12,060.
Behind them, and content to be gov
erned by them, are some 2.000.000
natives, who are still savages. ’Hie
president is described by the London
Times as “a full-blooded negro, a
West Indian and a man of education
and refinement.” He was elected in
1904, and is now serving his second
term.
Till recently the fact about Liberia
best known in Europe was that it had
contracted a public debt which it
never tried to pay. Now that Sir
Harry Johnston, the African traveler,-
discovering the great natural re
sources of the country, has interested
himself in its development it is like
ly to excite more attention. Under
his anqnices the Liberian Develop
ment Chartered Company has obtain
ed concessions for prospecting, work
in** minerals, hanking, nrnntring land,
constructing roads and building rail
way*. By January, 1906, the com-
pany had invested $500,000 in Libe
rian, and soon after two British offi
cials were appointed to reorganize the
finances and customs service of the
country. Public improvements have
been begun. Motor roads into the
trackless interior are being made, and
it is hoped that the American negroes
will, after .a time, take kindly to the
industrial era which it is desired to
inaugurate. There is some jealousy
of white people, it appears. They
are allowed only on the frontiers, and
are not permitted to have houses or
do business in the interior.
The trade done at present is limit
ed. Liberia exports chiefly palm oil,
palm kemals, coffee, rubber and fiber.
The said to be of extremely
fine quality. The imports consist of
cotton goods, articles of iron and pro
visions. The rubber exports in 190 C
were worth $70,000, and the total
value of exports sent to England was
$291,000. This is a small showing
for a republic, but it is expected that
European enterprises, “conducted on
reasonable lines, and with a proper
regard for the interests of the na
tives,” will give a fresh impetus to
local effort.
The Times expresses a hope that
“the little State which has been for
so many years in a condition of sus
pended animation will rouse itself in
to more vigorous life, and perhaps af
ter all justify some of the expecta
tions of its original founders who
looked to it to demonstrate the capac
ity of the negro race for self-govern
pient. ” So far the experiment has
virtually failed in Liberia, as it has
done in Haiti, and in our Southern
States.—Augusta Herald.
FLAGLER LOSES $15,000,000 IN
SEA RAILROAD.
After having sunk $15,000,000. into
his seagoing railroad across the Flor
ida Keys, with Key West as the ter
minal, Henry M. Flagler has been
obliged to abandon the work which
was the dream of his life.
The millions spent by Mr. Flagler
have seriously crippled him financial
ly.
Mr. Flagler finds himself in the
same position as Henry M. Rogers, a
brother chief in Standard Oil, with
his Tidewater Railroad in Virginia.
Millions must be advanced if the
work is to go on, and neither can find
the money.
The blow falls harder on the man
who has won the title of “King of
Florida.” He has always looked up
on this extension of the Florida East
Coast from Miami to Key West, the
southern tip of the United States, as
the imperishable monument which he
would leave to posterity.
Financial worry over the ever in
creasing cost of the road and the im
possibility of securing, the necessary
money was, his friends declare, the
direct cause of the serious physical
breakdown which he suffered last
summer.
Mr. Flagler caused to be issued a
statement that the work had been
abandoned temporarily on account of
the tightness of the money market.
GIVES $500,000 MORE.
Andrew Carnegie has placed $500,-
000 to the credit of the trustees of
the Enoch Pratt Free Library at Bal
timore, to be used in building branch
libraries in different parts of the city.
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